natural history

Philippa Jamieson

Wild Heart: The Possibility of Wilderness in Aotearoa New Zealand, edited by Mick Abbott and Richard Reeve (Otago University Press) 224 pp. $45; Making Our Place: Exploring Land-use Tensions in Aotearoa New Zealand, edited by Jacinta Ruru, Janet Stephenson and Mick Abbott, (Otago University Press), 243 pp. $45.

Although we are becoming an increasingly indoor nation, our wild and natural landscapes, our ‘clean, green’ image, and our agricultural heritage all remain strong in the identity of most New Zealanders. The topics discussed in these two books have wide appeal. Both books address current and contested questions about our use of and relationship with the land, and provide glimpses into history. My concern is that they may be read by only a narrow range of potential readers – mostly by academics and professionals over 40, I suspect, unless interviews, magazine articles, blog posts and so on can draw other readers in.

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Denis Harold

Seabird Genius: the Story of L.E. Richdale, the Royal Albatross and the Yellow-eyed Penguin, by Neville Peat (Otago University Press, 2011), 288 pp. $45

The establishment of the albatross colony at Tairoa Head on Otago Peninsula is iconic, but not so the individual largely responsible. Lance Richdale, born just days into the beginning of the twentieth century, saw his first albatross egg in November 1936 and was later devastated when he learned that vandals had stolen it. In fact, because of predators, no chick had successfully fledged in many years. He lobbied for the building of a protective fence, and the following season camped in his spare time near the nest of a single surviving chick. When after eight months it flew out to sea, local and foreign newspapers reported this exceptional event.

Prior to his contact with albatross, Richdale had begun intensive observations of yellow-eyed penguins on Otago Peninsula. After five seasons encompassing 800 visits to the colonies, he produced a two-volume manuscript, which unfortunately was not published because of the Second World War. He also began a twenty-year study of petrels on tiny Whero Island off the coast of Stewart Island.

Richdale was the first person in New Zealand to band seabirds systematically over time, and the second in the world to band penguins. His close observations of seabirds enabled him to debunk various fallacies, and to make many discoveries. He disproved the widely held notion that albatross deliberately starved their chicks in the later stages of rearing; and in regard to penguins he identified ‘14 types of behavior when pairs interacted’. Long-term studies of seabirds are still a rarity.
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